Most Underrated TOS Episode?

[tranya]

I'm alone at home tonight, bored and thinking of watching a TOS episode. I've seen all the "great" episodes a gazillion times, all the "terrible" episodes a gazillion times, and want to rediscover an episode I might have forgotten was better than I remember it.

The list of typical "great" episodes varies, of course, but tends to include City on the Edge of Forever, Trouble With Tribbles, Mirror Mirror, Doomsday Machine, etc., while the list of typical "terrible" episodes also varies, often including Spock's Brain, And the Children Shall Lead, The Way to Eden, etc. I tend to always revisit these poles when watching a Trek... how about those 70 or so episodes in-between?

What, in your opinion, is a terribly overlooked episode? A terribly underrated episode? One that people tend to forget about?

And why?

 

[Michael]

Personally I always thought All Our Yesterdays is way underrated. It's probably my favorite TOS episode (well, together with Journey to Babel and Space Seed and ... ). No, really, I love this little gem (people who participated in the TOS hurt/heal game will most likely remember how I fought for that episode). I don't really care for the Kirk subplot, but the McCoy/Spock interaction is what never ceases to get me intrigued. I tend to really enjoy the McCoy/Spock moments on the series (like in Bread and Circuses or The Tholian Web etc.). Also Spock's relationship with Zarabeth (Marianne Hartley, a sight to behold) is something special amoung all the TOS love affairs. At least in my opinion. Beside all of that, I really love the snowy imagery of the Sarpeidon sets. It really is an episode best watched when it is cold outside.

Oh, and who doesn't love Mr. Atoz?

 

[Nerdius Maximus]

Friday's Child.

 

[Maab of the Ten Tribes]

Well i'll agree with All Our Yesterdays. However, i have an affinity for Fridays Child....as you might can tell.

 

[Michael]

Well i'll agree with All Our Yesterdays. However, i have an affinity for Fridays Child....as you might can tell.

Nah, it's really subtle.

 

[BillJ]

I've always had a soft spot for The Omega Glory. E pleb neesta!!!

 

[Neopeius]

I really really like Changeling. Also Who Mourns for Adonais. Don't know if those are typical faves. I also am a fan of Spectre of the Gun.

All our Yesterdays is definitely a gem. Speaking of Jems, the Empath is quite good too. Ditto Whom Gods Destroy.

When Trek is good, it's great.

And it's usually good.

 

[Michael]

^ I agree, The Changeling and The Empath are classics. I love them.

 

[sbk1234]

The Man Trap gets a lot of critisizm, but I find some genuine quality to it. Even though they were running around to kill the "monster", Kirk brings it all home at the end when he remarks, "Just thinking about the buffalo." Even at it's "worst" there was more to TOS than rayguns and rocketships.

 

[Neopeius]

Even at it's "worst" there was more to TOS than rayguns and rocketships.

That is so true. There are very few worthless episodes. In fact, I can name.. two.

But I won't, because Beaker will come out and beat me up.

 

[Basil]

Always thought "The Omega Glory" gets a bad rap. Its racial politics aside, it's a good moral dilemma that gives the audience a chance to ponder both the Trek conceit of the evolved man and the contrast between a strong, smart starship captain who is corrupted by temptation and another who is not.

What I also find interesting is the production values of this episode: it looks much less like a late second season episode and more like a mid first season one, right down to the lighting, and Shatner looks in much better shape than he did in even some of the first season episodes. I enjoy learning more about Spock, and the humor and friendship between Kirk, Spock, and McCoy works well.

Given the parallel worlds premise I don't find the ending hokey at all -- heck, if we can so easily accept a future that is 90% caucasian, populated by aliens who are also magically 90% caucasian, when the world today doesn't look remotely like that, why can't we accept that a world we're told is parallel to ours and produced the U. S. Constitution?

 

[Mallory]

Friday's Child.

I agree. There's some truly excellent "Scotty in command" scenes in that episode, watching Kirk and Spock use bow and arrows is cool and McCoy's "I'm a doctor, not an elevator" line is a classic.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

"Bread and Circuses" and "Tomorrow is Yesterday"

 

[wellsweb]

I've always liked "This Side of Paradise". Any time you get to see Spock out of character is a fun episode. I also like 'Patterns of Force". The bad guys are Nazis. The good guys win. What more could you ask for?

 

[TheThrasson]

The Man Trap gets a lot of critisizm, but I find some genuine quality to it. Even though they were running around to kill the "monster", Kirk brings it all home at the end when he remarks, "Just thinking about the buffalo." Even at it's "worst" there was more to TOS than rayguns and rocketships.

The Man Trap is one of my fovorite episodes. It has an element of horror that no other episode has. Uhura's scene is especialy gripping. The casting of Uhura's crewmen and Green worked quite well. In Uhura's scene, the look on the crewman's face as he goes in for the kill really pulls me into the screen. Green's smirk as he realizes he's fooling the landing party makes me smirk too. The excelent score does wonders for the horror as well.

The sweat was a great touch. It makes you feel the heat and adds a feel of desperate tension. Spock's green blood makes an apperance emphasizing his alien nature, and adds to long term charactor development.

 

[Sir Rhosis]

Ditto for "The Man Trap," a favorite of mine which is often overlooked. And as a fan of the Bard, I also quite enjoy "The Conscience of the King," and have shown this ep to "literary snob" friends to see if they can get past their "Silly Sci-Fi" prejudices.

Sir Rhosis

 

[GodThingFormerly]

Return to Tomorrow and The Immunity Syndrome. Speculating upon the ultimate cosmological destiny of humankind just isn't something that the vast majority of franchise weenies respond well to, I guess.

TGT

 

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

Return to Tomorrow and The Immunity Syndrome. Speculating upon the ultimate cosmological destiny of humankind just isn't something that the vast majority of franchise weenies respond well to, I guess.

TGT

I rather enjoyed those episodes. I've always like the bigger implications of humankind's destiny in the universe from TOS, TMP and the first two seasons of TNG; although, "All Good Things..." tried to bring some of that back, but a little too late imnsho.


Imagine if ModTrek did them, there'd be some technobabbled ionic, photonic, etc. explanation for Sargon and the big amoeba. There'd be hardly any cosmological discussion on humanity's ultimate purpose in the universe and both episodes would've been resolved in the denoument by some neturonic device that Data, Dax or Kim would've come up with.

 

[johcomp]

I'm a huge fan of Return of the Archons - very creepy at the start with the hooded Lawgivers, the Festival and when Landru "summons the body" and the villagers become almost attacking Zombies! O and a classic Kirk talking a computer to death climax - great stuff!

If you disagree, you're NOT of the Body and will be absorbed! Lawgivers!!!!!

 

[Nerdius Maximus]

Return to Tomorrow and The Immunity Syndrome. Speculating upon the ultimate cosmological destiny of humankind just isn't something that the vast majority of franchise weenies respond well to, I guess.

TGT

Those are both great episodes.